Now that image would have grabbed your attention! Sadly this article is not about Designer Briefs as in half naked women, but rather about putting together a clear and precise design or creative brief to give to your graphic designer.

So why is a design brief important? Why can’t the designer simply figure out what you want with a telephone call? The answer to that is quite simple. You know your business better than anyone. You know what you like and what you don’t, you know the culture, the clients and your product or service. By spending a bit of time putting together a written explanation outlining the goals and objectives of a design project, you will essentially provide the designer with all the information they need to create an effective design that will achieve it’s goal.

A detailed and articulate brief is a crucial part of the design process; it helps to establish an understanding between the client and designer that ultimately serves as a reference tool throughout the project. Here are some very helpful areas to include in your brief.

Company Profile
Introduce your company with a short description of your organisation. Tell your designer what product or service you provide, mention your company mission statement or philosophy, give a concise company history and describe your company niche and industry sector.

Define Your Target Audience
Identify your primary audience. Be specific with any demographic figures about your audience that you have. These figures will be useful to the designer. Include age, gender, household income level, occupation, and geographic location. Saying that you target everyone is not specific enough. Be tough as the more targeted your collateral the better the outcome will be.

Set Your Goal
Define the project and what you would like the outcome to be. For example, do you want to increase the number of new clients, increase repeat business, get more traffic to your website or have more followers on Facebook or Twitter? Good design can influence the success of a company but clear goals must be set. Sitting down to write the design brief will help you set those goals.

Establish a Budget
Providing budget expectations will give the designer a good idea of what type of solution they can provide you to fit in with your means. Withholding this information for fear of being over-charged is a common misconception about working with designers. Start with honesty up front and most likely you will receive good service in return. There are many ways that a designer can amend the brief to fit in with your budget – printing on a different stock, changing the size of the originally intended piece or producing slightly less pieces than originally planned by looking at the target audience and streamlining the message.

Be Specific
Clearly articulate what it is that needs to be designed. For example is it a business card, a 5 page website or a 4 page brochure? The above information is not enough for a designer to design from let alone quote on. You’ll need to take into account:

• what size in dimensions will it be?
• will it be printed in full colour, with a special Pantone colour or even silver or gold ink?
• what stock do you want it printed on – bond, flyer stock or card – maybe you want plastic business cards or a special linen stock for your letterhead?
• will it is printed double sided?
• how many do you need printed or how many pages will the website have?
• what pages/navigation will the website consist of
• what special features may it require, such as rotating banners, member log in areas, shopping cart etc?
• does it have a special finish such a celloglazing, embossing or foiling?

All of these things can significantly affect the budget so be mindful of wanting caviar when you only have a fish and chips budget.

Set a Deadline
Let your designer know if there is a specific deadline, such as a holiday or special event that has to be met. Keep in mind that if you leave your project to the last minute, many designers will apply a loading to their regular rate as they will have to down tools on other jobs. To avoid this from happening, always be prepared and give your designer a realistic amount of time to produce work that you will be happy with.

Decision Makers
If your project involves the approval of other people in the organisation make sure they have helped you write the brief or thoroughly reviewed it. Resolve any differences at the beginning to ensure the brief is as effective as possible.

Gather Examples
Collect collateral of any visuals you like as you prepare the brief. Design is a visual medium so a verbal description of “the cool business card with a green background” has little meaning. You can certainly use emotive words when describing the look and feel that you are after. When presenting the design examples in the brief take note of what you like about the colours, imagery or typography.

Don’t forget to attach samples of your company’s current marketing materials for further reference. This may be to demonstrate what you feel works or alternatively what you don’t want to repeat.

Double Check
Review and refine the brief before sending it out. This is the first step of the project and the attention spent now will guide its future success. Always keep in mind that this is simply a guide for the designer. They will not copy what you have done (unless you are explicit in this instruction) but will rather take this information and problem solve through creative design solutions, to come up with a piece of collateral that you can be proud of.

white river design has a design brief template that we readily provide to our clients who struggle with putting a creative brief together. To get your copy, simply call us on 02 4732 4766 or email us and we can provide that to you.

So, we have been trying out this theory and guess what? It actually works! We have been setting weekly, monthly and quarterly financial goals that our team strives to meet. When we reach them (at the end of the quarter) we, as a team are rewarded.So what rewards are on offer? When we do our quarterly team planning session, we all throw in ideas of what we would like as a reward. The team then decides on something that they will all be happy with. Last year we decided to set a half yearly goal (it was our first attempt and we have since noted that shorter goal times are better, so are now trying quarterly goals). We achieved our target! YAY! So the white river design team enjoyed a three and a half hour day spa pamper at the gorgeous award winning Spa Sublime in the Blue Mountains. This was a win/win for everyone as we were able to treat the team while supporting Spa Sublime who is a client of ours.At the beginning of 2012 we upped the anti and set new weekly goals. These have deliberately been set to push us a little further out of our comfort zone. The team agreed that as a reward they would like to spend a day being creative! Funny that!Christina Frost-Clayton who is an artist based in the Blue Mountains who runs ‘Art and High Tea in the Garden‘.Being a in the creative industry we decided to theme this quarter HIGH CreativiTEA. Internally our focus is to reach our targets so that we can enjoy this fantastic day out. However, externally our focus is to the benefit of our clients as we aim to spend additional energy on Creative Ideas, Creative Design, Creative Solutions and Creative Branding. This is something that we do as part of our work everyday, but we are focusing special attention on this to push ourselves even when we are faced with ridiculous deadlines.

To add a bit of fun to this theme we have created material to enhance HIGH CreativiTEA. A series of rotating banners have been added to the home page of our website, as well as being uploaded to our Facebook and Pinterest accounts.During the month of March we have also been hosting a morning tea in our office at 10:30am for anyone who would like to pop in and have a chat and a cuppa. The atmosphere is relaxed and laid back as we feel that this is a great opportunity to take half an hour off and enjoy each other’s company. Everyone that visits our office is also sent home with a tea bag adorned with our very own swing tag.

The HIGH CreativiTEA aspect of our target is a fun way for us to achieve a serious goal. Since implementing this simple system of SMART goals and rewards, we have have seen an increase of 67% is sales. Will we meet our target for this quarter? Not sure yet, but we are certainly on track. Watch our Facebook page for further updates and possible photos of our day enjoying Art in the Garden with High Tea.
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Great news! Our team made target so we got to enjoy our HIGH CreativiTEA reward! Check out our Facebook page for photos of the day.

Colour is a visual cue that communicates brand attributes such as traditional or contemporary, dynamic or calm, as well as cultural meanings, political affiliations and environmental stands – just to name a few. In the design of branding, the choice of colour can provide a wealth of powerful messages about your brand.

In the last few years the importance of colour as a brand identity has become a big issue for large companies. In the past it was unclear whether trademark law protected distinctive colours that had become strongly associated with a particular product or manufacturer. Considering the fact that colours are in limited supply, would allowing companies to own a single colour or a colour combination lead to the depletion of all of the attractive colours in each product line?

So what exactly does ‘trademarking a colour’ mean?

“A colour trademark is a non-conventional trademark where at least one colour is used to perform the trademark function of uniquely identifying the commercial origin of products or services. In recent times colours have been increasingly used as trade marks in the marketplace. However, it has traditionally been difficult to protect colours as trademarks through registration, as a colour as such was not considered to be a distinctive ‘trademark’. This issue was addressed by the World Trade Organisation Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, which broadened the legal definition of trademark to encompass “any sign…capable of distinguishing the goods or services of one undertaking from those of other undertakings”.

Despite the recognition which must be accorded to colour trademarks in most countries, the graphical representation of such marks sometimes constitutes a problem for trademark owners seeking to protect their marks, and different countries have different methods for dealing with this issue.
Wikipedia

Many companies have successfully trademarked their colour. Tiffany Blue for example is the colloquial name for the light medium robin egg blue colour associated with the famous New York City jewellery company, Tiffany & Co.

The colour is produced as a private custom colour by Pantone, with PMS number 1837, the number deriving from the year of Tiffany’s foundation. As a trademarked colour, it is not publicly available and is not printed in the Pantone Matching System swatch books. Tiffany Blue is probably the most famous trademarked colour – but just because Tiffany trademarked it – they only own that blue in situations where it could be confused with their products. You could paint your house that colour or even style your wedding in Tiffany Blue, without having a problem.

Given the wide range of products Tiffany sells, and the uniqueness of their shade of blue, Tiffany probably owns that blue for just about any kind of box that jewellery or other gift could come in. To protect their brand from being leveraged off by other jewellers or companies in the luxury gift arena, all they would have to say in a court of law is, “If your spouse or loved one gave you a box that colour blue, would you assume it came from Tiffany & Co.?” Case closed.

Australian and overseas entities have sought to trademark colours, including purple for chocolate and orange for champagne.

Attention has focused on the 2006 Federal Court decision in Cadbury vs Darrell Lea Chocolate, where there was a dispute between chocolate makers about the use of the ‘Cadburys’ purple in the Darrell Lea packaging. The judge ruled in favour of Darrell Lea stating, “I am not satisfied that such usage has resulted, or would result, in … purchasers of chocolate being misled or deceived.”

It is quite clear then, that colour does attribute to a very large role in brand recognition. Coca-cola red, Yellow Pages yellow or Starbucks green all play an important role in providing brand attributes to the brands that they are associated with.

So the question then becomes, “how do I get the right colour for my brand?” The answer is not all that simple. You need to understand the meaning and symbolism of colour, how it makes people feel and what images they conjure up when they think of certain colours.

Cymbolism is a great site that allows you to vote on the meanings of colour as well as search words and the colours that relate to them. If you get stuck and need help, you can always contact your design team at White River Design who are passionate about colour on 02 4732 4766!

A lot of colour associations are derived from the commercial marketplace, but this isn’t the only place that they come from. Colour meanings also originate from countries, cities, schools, sports teams, street gangs, companies big and small – they all have signature colours.

The use of colour can make or break a design. It is also very important to know your target market because if it includes a culture other than the Western World, you need to understand that their meaning of colour can be vastly different to our meaning of colour…

RED
Red is traditionally known to us as the danger and passion colour. It’s the colour of blood and fire but is also associated with energy, danger, strength, power, love and desire.

Fire engines, ambulances, stop signs and red traffic lights all indicate elements of danger. It is bright and vibrant and hard to miss. The colour of love, red hearts and long stemmed red roses, the colour oozes sexuality with images of women in red stilettos and red lipstick. Red sports cars are both a passion and danger sign. In fact, red cars are prohibited in Brazil as statistics show that despite the colour’s high visibility, more red cars are involved in accidents than any other colour.

In Asia red is the colour for summer, good luck, joy, good fortune and fertility. It is the traditional colour for a wedding dress. Red also has a very strong connection with Communist China.

In Africa red is the colour that Chiefs in Nigeria wear but is also very strongly associated with death and bloodshed. In countries like Ghana it is worn while in mourning and in Madagascar it is used for burial cloths.

YELLOW
Yellow is the sunshine colour – it’s generally associated with joy, energy, intellect and food. It is the most visible colour from a distance. Sadly good design is often compromised for this fact. Yellow to its detriment can seem cheap. When overused, yellow can have a disturbing effect for example it’s a known fact that babies cry more in yellow rooms.

It is a cautionary colour often used in life vests, tape to cordon off police investigation areas and used with alternating black and yellow stripes indicates a hazardous area. For the most part yellow is considered to be a happy colour, warm, welcoming, spontaneous, aspiring and exhilarating. Do keep in mind that in the English language yellow has negative connotations of a coward and that in journalism yellow means biased and inflammatory news reporting.

In Asia yellow is the colour symbol for earth (maybe due to the colour of their soil). For several centuries yellow was reserved exclusively for the Imperial family and still carries the echo of power and royalty. Yellow is also the colour of joy, happiness, high spirits and sunshine.

BLUE
Blue is the favourite colour for companies and organisations who wish to convey their reliability and trustworthiness – ‘True Blue’. Although it is a bit cold, stiff and unexciting, blue indicates quality, value, strength and authority. Dark blue is the colour of officialdom – police uniforms, surgery scrubs etc. Dark blue suits are often also worn in business by high powered individuals with terms such as blue chip, blue ribbon and blue bloody.

In America, blue is the colour of the study of philosophy. On the flip side blue is a ‘sad’ colour – singing the blues, blue humour and having the blues.

In Asia blue signifies the sky and water – it has positive associations and is often used in decoration. Water is considered a feminine aspect of nature and in the Chinese language blue is described as shallow and deep rather than light and dark.

GREEN
Green is the colour of money and nature. It is the ‘go’ colour as in the green traffic light. Newly a symbol for environmentalism, green has always been linked to forests, crops growth and harvest. Dark green is considered to be outdoorsy and masculine – a favourite colour for cars. In food, green symbolises freshness, health and mint flavour. As green gets lighter it becomes less appealing. As it heads towards more yellow tones, it resembles bile, slime and disease. Due to its calming nature, a flat, grayish green – dubbed “institutional green” has become the unofficial colour for the hallways in schools, underfunded municipalities and poor neighbourhoods. Negative connotations towards the colour green are envy, jealousy and inexperience.

In Asia green is closely linked with jade and recalls it’s value and desirability. Green represents plants, crops and spring. It is the colour for birth and youth and implies exuberance and enthusiasm.

In Africa green symbolises fertility.

BLACK
Black is traditionally linked to death, despair, morbidity, evil, sin and negation. The black hole in outer space is a metaphor for absolute nothingness. Black does however command respect, it is meant to be taken seriously. It is the colour worn by nuns and clergy. Black means business and can also be perennially chic, sophisticated, dramatic and extremely formal. Due to its lack of colour, the texture of black can take on different meanings. A matte black surface can imply something sturdy, industrial and high tech while gloss black is sleek and powerful with a hint of danger or malevolence. Black also tends to be sexy.

In Asia, black is the symbol colour for water so it carries impressions of depth, truth, life and stability. Black has little religious significance but does represent darkness, mystery and the unknown.

In Africa black implies age, maturity and spirituality.

WHITE
White has many paradoxical connotations, for example in Western culture it can mean clean, pure, peace, elegant, perfect and sanitary while on the other hand it can also symbolise ghostly, antiseptic, empty, boring and unfinished. White is the academic colour of the arts and conjours images of a newly painted room, blank canvas and clean sheets. White means new, fresh and ready to go.

In Asia white is the colour for death and mourning, it is also considered pure and neutral.

In Africa white is the colour for victory or purity and is worn by girls for puberty rites.

There are so many different colours in the colour spectrum and with limited space I have just taken the top 6. Please also be aware that different tones of each colour can have different meanings as well (I will cover this in the next post) and this is just a brief overview on colour in general. It is also supposed to highlight how different cultures read different meanings into colours and that you should be aware of this fact.

We have put together a short video with examples of our work. Branding is what we love to do best, but are happy to help out with additional design projects such as packaging, newsletters, websites, brochures, signage (including retractable banners, vehicle signage and large format sign boards)!

There is so much that we can assist you with and we can’t help but take delight in everything we get to create!

Enjoy!

For most businesses the first form of contact is over the telephone. It goes without saying then, that a professional, yet friendly telephone manner is paramount in obtaining or engaging a new client.

Even more important is the way that business phones are answered. Far too often, small business operators answer their line with a curt ‘yes’. To maintain a professional image, you merely have to answer the phone correctly and speak clearly.

Here are a few simple tips to put you on the road to having a professional telephone manner:

1. Answer the phone within three to four rings. No one wants to wait for ages for the phone to be answered.
2. Start with a greeting (ensure that your tone is friendly and welcoming).
3. Identify the name of your business so that your (potential) client is aware that they have reached the correct place.
4. Identify yourself. This gives a friendly approachable feel. It’s wise to finish your sentence with your name so that it’s the last word the caller hears, which means that they are more likely to remember it. For example, instead of “…Helen speaking”, say, “…this is Helen”.

So remember, the way you answer your phone and the tone that you use can in itself improve your business and your brand. It really isn’t hard, doesn’t take much time or effort and it’s absolutely free.

Corporate identity and corporate image are two entirely different things.

Simply put, a corporate identity is everything that is seen that promotes the business – the logo, business stationery, brochures, web site etc.

To help with branding a business, these elements all need to have continuity and look as though they ‘belong’ to the same company.

Maintaining the same colours, fonts and tag lines are all ways of getting your customer to recognise that it is your business. We all know the ‘NIKE’ tick, or the ‘Coca-Cola’ red. These companies have taken their corporate identity and used it to gain international recognition.

Corporate image on the other hand is how the public perceives you – this is also referred to as your brand. For example if you are in IT you might wear a suit to project a professional image. However, a surf-wear manufacturer or retailer might only ever wear board shorts and t-shirts as this will emphasise their comfort and laid back image.

A business might also create an image by the way they deal with customers. If people have to make an appointment to be seen, they will get the perceived impression that the business is busy and that their time is precious. This in turn could give the organisation the image of a higher profile, and in some cases make the business appear larger than it is.

Your corporate identity and image need to compliment each other to be effective.